Latest news with #RajiSourani
Middle East Eye
09-04-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Top Gaza lawyer who survived Israeli air strike seeks prosecution of UK citizens
Raji Sourani, founder and director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, is widely considered to be one of the world's leading Palestinian lawyers. In early 2024, he narrowly survived an Israeli air strike in Gaza which blew up his two-storey home. In late February that year, he crossed into Egypt with his family. Since 2015, Sourani has led the legal team representing Palestinian victims at the International Criminal Court. And in the past year, he has been working with South Africa's legal team in its genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Now the lawyer is in Britain with a new aim - seeking the prosecution of 10 British citizens accused of committing war crimes in Gaza with the Israeli military. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters On Monday, Sourani joined a team of legal experts at New Scotland Yard in London in submitting a 240-page report to the Metropolitan Police's war crimes team. The report was filed on behalf of his organisation, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), and the Public Interest Law Centre (PILC). 'We give very serious evidence' The 10 people accused include Israeli dual nationals. They are suspected of crimes including murder, extermination, attacking civilians and the deportation or forcible transfer of a population. "We are here for a very special mission," Sourani told Middle East Eye on Monday, "to say to the police that there are British [citizens] who are involved in these crimes - war crimes, persecution, crimes against humanity - in the Gaza Strip, and these people should be held accountable. A team of legal experts submitted a war crimes complaint to the Metropolitan Police in London on Monday against 10 British nationals accused of committing war crimes for the Israeli military in Gaza — Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) April 9, 2025 "We give very serious evidence for them. We collected it and we have it." "We are giving them these files so that they know and they have to proceed," he added. Sourani said he expects the police to take action: "This is a rule of law country and what we anticipate or expect is that this should work effectively, and hold these suspects accountable." ICJ president 'plagiarised 32 percent of pro-Israel dissenting opinion' Read More » But he levied heavy criticism against Prime Minister Keir Starmer for having denied that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. In November last year, Starmer - a former human rights lawyer - was asked in parliament to share his definition of genocide and to outline what action he was taking to save the lives of people in Gaza. In response, he said he was "well aware of the definition of genocide" and that this explained why he had "never described or referred to [the situation in Gaza] as genocide". His remarks followed similar denials from Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who suggested that Israel is not committing genocide in Gaza because millions of people have not been killed. "I think it's a big shame on the prime minister and prosecutor if they are saying it's not genocide," Sourani told MEE. "I'm representing the victims. I'm the one who is on the ground and building these files. You don't need to be a first-class lawyer to prove that. The genocide is being broadcast live." 'You cannot be selective' Sourani sent a message to Starmer: "How many, Mr Prime Minister, do you need of Gaza's children and women to be dead? How many of them do you need to be in famine? How many of them do you need to be displaced and to be kicked out of the Gaza Strip? "It's a big shame when 18,000 children of Gaza [have been killed] and he doesn't recognise genocide." 'How many, Mr Prime Minister, do you need of Gaza's children and women to be dead?' - Raja Sourani Sourani continued: "You didn't prevent it. You covered it up. You gave reasons for it. This is going on livestream, 18 months, and you still don't recognise it. This is a big shame on the British government." Now, he said, was the time for legal action against individuals responsible for war crimes in Gaza. "You are calling for rule of law, democracy, human rights. You cannot be selective. You cannot politicise this." The report, which has been prepared by a team of UK lawyers and researchers in The Hague and is based on six months of research, covers alleged offences committed from October 2023 to May last year. Jake Taylor, a barrister from Doughty Street Chambers, was one of the legal experts behind the report. "This has been a six-month intensive process, with the team of lawyers working around the clock in order to go through the vast amount of material available," he told MEE. "Under British law, there is an obligation to investigate British nationals for international crimes if there is significant suspicion. The police will conduct their own investigation. The Hind Rajab Foundation: Pursuing Israeli soldiers worldwide for Gaza war crimes Read More » "The majority of [the report] is open source. We have not done the investigation for the police. We have accumulated all this evidence and passed it on to them, and asked them to investigate themselves." If the police decide there is a reasonable prospect of conviction and it is in the public interest to prosecute, prosecutions will proceed. "I think it's about time for the ICC to activate itself again and do something more serious. They do have the chain of command and they do have the evidence. We are sure that they have enough to act," Taylor said. The Brussels-based Hind Rajab Foundation has sought to initiate nearly 100 cases against Israeli soldiers in 14 countries with universal jurisdiction: Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Cyprus, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Serbia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden and Thailand. In January this year, the Israeli military advised dozens of soldiers against travelling abroad after reportedly tracking around 30 war crimes complaints and legal actions targeting its personnel for their roles in operations in Gaza.
The National
07-04-2025
- Politics
- The National
Ten British members of Israeli military accused of war crimes
Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza Ten Britons who fought with the Israeli military in Gaza could be investigated for war crimes by the Metropolitan Police after lawyers lodged a report on Monday. The 240-page report filed by prominent barrister Michael Mansfield KC, among others, documents alleged war crimes committed in Gaza between October 2023 and May last year. It identifies and accuses the 10 Britons of involvement in crimes including the 'targeted' killing of civilians and aid workers, 'indiscriminate' attacks on civilian areas and the forced transfer and displacement of civilians. Israel has repeatedly denied that its political leaders or military have committed war crimes during the war in Gaza. The Met Police's War Crimes Unit considers allegations made against people who are in the UK or are likely to enter the country in the near future. It is also supporting the International Criminal Court into its investigation in Palestine, and will submit any relevant information it receives to the court. Anybody can submit a report to the unit, including individual victims. Once received, the Met Police and the Crown Prosecution Service will determine whether there is sufficient grounds to open an investigation, and whether there is any relevant information to pass on to the ICC. The names of the 10 Britons identified in the report, and the full report, cannot be released until the Metropolitan Police considers the complaint. But the Public Interest Legal Centre (PILC), a UK legal charity which commissioned the report, said it included officers in the Israeli military. Lawyers involved in the report hope it will highlight the UK's moral obligations in Palestine, and bring British nationals complicit in war crimes to justice. Evidence submitted in the report includes those compiled by Palestine Centre for Human Rights in Gaza, which has a 45-member team documenting violations across Gaza. It is by the prominent Palestinian lawyer Raji Sourani, who is known as 'Mr ICC' for his work preparing cases documenting human rights violations and war crimes. Individual Israeli soldiers, including those residing in the UK, have in the past been identified through social media posts and public lectures they have given about the war in Gaza. 'As a law centre based in Britain, we have a duty to stand up. We're filing our report to make clear these war crimes are not in our name,' said PILC director Paul Heron. About 100 legal and human rights experts have also signed a letter of support urging the War Crimes Team to investigate any and all complaints regarding involvement in war crimes and crimes against humanity. Section 51 of the International Criminal Court Act 2001 states that it 'is an offence against the law of England and Wales for a person to commit genocide, a crime against humanity, or a war crime', even if it takes place outside this jurisdiction. Earlier war crimes referrals to the Met Police implicating five British ministers did not result in a Met Police investigation, according to the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians, which lodged those complaints in October 2023. The ICJP is also working on applications for the private prosecution of British members of the Israeli military.
Arab News
07-04-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Dossier accuses British serving in Israeli military of war crimes in Gaza
LONDON: A group of UK citizens who served with the Israeli military in Gaza will be the subject of a war crimes complaint handed to the Metropolitan Police, The Guardian reported on Monday. A 240-page dossier compiled by a group of lawyers based in The Hague documents the activities of 10 Brits in Gaza, with complaints against them including alleged targeting of civilians and aid workers, coordinated attacks on hospitals and protected sites, and the forced displacement of people. The dossier, which covers the period from October 2023 to May 2024 and took six months to compile, will be handed to the Met's war crimes unit. The complaint against the 10 Brits, who cannot be named for legal reasons, will be brought on behalf of the Gaza-based Palestinian Centre for Human Rights and the UK-based Public Interest Law Centre. The dossier includes eyewitness testimony from civilians in Gaza. One passage features evidence from a witness who recalled an attack on a hospital, including seeing corpses 'scattered on the ground, especially in the middle of the hospital courtyard, where many dead bodies were buried in a mass grave.' The account added that a bulldozer being used to demolish part of the hospital 'ran over a dead body in a horrific and heart-wrenching scene desecrating the dead.' Raji Sourani, director of the PCHR, said: 'This is illegal, this is inhuman and enough is enough. The government cannot say we didn't know; we are providing them with all the evidence.' PILC legal director Paul Heron said: 'We're filing our report to make clear these war crimes are not in our name.' The 2001 International Criminal Court Act says it 'is an offence against the law of England and Wales for a person to commit genocide, a crime against humanity, or a war crime.' Michael Mansfield KC, the lawyer leading the group, said: 'If one of our nationals is committing an offence, we ought to be doing something about it. Even if we can't stop the government of foreign countries behaving badly, we can at least stop our nationals from behaving badly. 'British nationals are under a legal obligation not to collude with crimes committed in Palestine. No one is above the law.' Sean Summerfield, a barrister who also worked on the dossier, said: 'The public will be shocked, I would have thought, to hear that there's credible evidence that Brits have been directly involved in committing some of those atrocities.' More than 50,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 2023.
